Obama To Lift Some Curbs On Travel To Cuba

Wall Street Journal:

President Barack Obama plans to lift longstanding U.S. restrictions on Cuba, a senior administration official said, allowing Cuban-Americans to visit families there as often as they like and to send them unlimited funds.

The gesture, which could herald more openness with the Castro regime, will fulfill a campaign promise and follows more modest action in Congress this year to loosen travel rules.

Read the whole story: Wall Street Journal

Comments

[rockingbeat]

03:46 PM on 04/10/2009

Denying some Americans the right to visit Cuba is a violation of both the 14th Amendment and the UN Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Plus, we are allowed to visit other countries that are worse than Cuba, so it just looks like a vendetta against Castro.

[Citizen-Jane]

01:50 PM on 04/04/2009

This is good news and a first step to, hopefully, normalizing relations with Cuba. This U.S. - Cuban policy is a joke.

[rudyinbama]

01:35 PM on 04/04/2009

This is so wrong!
If some Americans can travel to Cuba, ALL Americans must be allowed..
Since when do we make special laws and privileges for different ethnic groups?
This needs to go right to the Supremes.

[bryansmith]

01:55 PM on 04/06/2009

One step at a time my friend

[wm1066]

12:13 PM on 04/04/2009

The ultra rightwing ex-cubans in miami must be having a fit right now, what will this do for fund raising for the over throw of Cuba when they can just fly to Cuba for a vacation.

[Princeton]

11:25 AM on 04/04/2009

The U.S. needs to stop this practice of squeezing the poor people around the world.

[Montgriz]

03:33 PM on 04/04/2009

ARe you kidding? There is no money in that...

[Mauiloa]

11:07 AM on 04/04/2009

Obama is still kow-towing to the Cuban-American community, which has been directly responsible for the suffering of their own people in Cuba for the past 50 years.

Politics be damned. Let those people go!!

[WasteNJ]

09:03 AM on 04/04/2009

Why is the reasoning for having a Cuban embargo still that they are simply not a "democracy"?
Is that it? Saudi Arabia isn't a democracy, neither is China, and we love us some Saudis!

Could it be that they overthrew our guy Bautista? The guy we installed?
This is so 60's.

[MrGill]

08:12 AM on 04/04/2009

Awesome, now maybe we can fly to Cuba and get decent healthcare without having to take out a second mortgage. Assuming you haven't lost your house already.

[Montgriz]

03:35 PM on 04/04/2009

Great point...the Cubans can produce very good doctors and nurses faster and cheaper than American universities and they seem to be superior as well. The complete recognition of Cuba would allow for Americans to get cheap and good medical care and it would benefit Cuba as well....So, I guess the whores in our congress will never allow that.....

[banja]

08:07 AM on 04/04/2009

it was about time, viva Cuba

[dutchman]

08:01 AM on 04/04/2009

Cuba is strong proof that however well intentioned, sanctions that punish entire populations rarely work. The merely empower the very leaders we're trying to get rid of. Fidel should be grateful to the US in helping him stay in power for 50 FREAKIN YEARS! And since Bush, we've had the same approach to Venezuela, where their tin pot despot would have been sidelined years ago except that we gave him the external "enemy" he needed to rally nationalistic support.

Sanctions are a politician's tool (so they can say they are doing something). They are not a diplomat's tool. Many career diplomats instead argue for what's known as the "bear hug" - trading openly with/providing aid to a people while restricting their leaders' movement outside their country (funny enough - this is kind of what Spain is doing with Bushco). The leader's support will crumble, at which point internal change becomes much more likely.

Oh, and black marketeering becomes less of a problem, too.

[kid5rivers2]

07:42 AM on 04/04/2009

http://kid5rivers.blogspot.com/2009/04/democracy-sucks.html

[1088]

07:15 AM on 04/04/2009

That is great! Now the Cubans can visit their love ones, and help lift their plight.

[traveler501]

06:47 AM on 04/04/2009

so 'overtures of travel aren't likely to result in a Democratic government in Cuba'...wow, that really matters to me. I just can't sleep nights knowing Cuba isn't Democratic...(although after 8 years of Bushco, I do sympathize)

[chicago25624]

06:35 AM on 04/04/2009

I find it amazing that EVERY country in the world trades with Cuba but the U.S.A., and because we don't trade with them, they are almost a 3rd world country.

OhBamalama you will reapthe shityousow

[clearthinker2008]

06:51 AM on 04/04/2009

If EVERY country in the world trades with them, why are they almost a 3rd world country because WE don't? We are not obligated to trade with ANYONE. Cuba's problems are deeper than "It's American's fault" thing some liberals get into. Having said that I'm glad Obama is making this move, we need to improve our relationships with our neighbors.

[Gerald Shields]

06:54 AM on 04/04/2009

That's because the Cuban-American community helped push for these restrictions.

[WasteNJ]

09:05 AM on 04/04/2009

It's true. Cubans in Florida vote Republican because of it.

[popart]

05:45 AM on 04/04/2009

VIVA CUBA......about time a president had the guts to recognize our neighbors to the south ( of Florida ) now how about sanctions against Florida....the state that gave us george w bush, a man that makes Castro by comparison look like a world class leader.

[chicago25624]

06:40 AM on 04/04/2009

Then how about, with your ID10T logic, we do the same and sanctionMassachusetts, where Kennedyisfrom. You remember him right, the President that imposed the embargo.